Heading off to college can be an exciting and emotional time in a young college-bound freshman's life. Students are often exhilarated to start the next phase of their lives and to finally leave the nest and be off on their own. Others are more trepid and anxiety-ridden at the prospect of moving away from family and being left to their own devices. Parents also have conflicting emotions: pride and joy, worry and anxiety, among others.
Yet, at the typical American university or college, freshmen and their families do not have time to adequately deal with these emotions, to spend a last day with their parents, or to relax and meet new college friends. Instead, there is typically a rush on moving day.
Students and their parents have to get their dorm rooms furnished and supplied with all the college essentials. New college freshmen are usually starting anew, needing to buy everything, including bedroom supplies (e.g., sheets and blankets), desk supplies (e.g., pens, pencils, highlighters, staplers and binder clips), shower supplies (e.g., shower sandals, shower caddy and towels), electrical and electronic supplies (e.g., surge protectors, lamps, USB flash drive and fans), and organizational supplies (e.g., desk caddies, laundry hampers and drawer organizers). This process is nothing short of: a hassle, a waste of time, a waste of money, a waste of gasoline, and a burden on the environment.
Moving day typically involves multiple trips back and forth to the car, van or moving truck to lug boxes and bags full of supplies into the dormitory building, up the elevator and into the dormitory room. Some choose to do the extent of their shopping beforehand, while others procrastinate and wait until moving day. Either way, multiple shopping trips are typically necessary, wasting a substantial number of hours in shopping and driving. In fact, at a typical Top-100 University, students and parents spend over 22,800 hours shopping and drive over 64,500 miles, wasting over 3,750 gallons of gasoline and 72,750 pounds of CO2 emissions.
Under this traditional model, students and parents buy their essentials at a local store or national chain. The store in turn gets these goods from manufacturers, though often not until they have passed through one or more intermediaries. Furthermore, each individual item is usually wrapped in plastic or cellophane, or worse yet, plastic clamshells, which are incredibly difficult and frustrating to open. At an average Top-100 University, this individual packaging amounts to 14.4 tons of post-consumer waste, which is often not biodegradable, filling up our landfills. This along with the large amount of transportation needed places a substantial drain on the environment.
This model also substantially adds to cost with each entity along the supply chain taking a mark-up along with additional transportation, marketing and advertising costs. In fact, the essential supplies that a new college freshman must purchase can easily exceed $1,200. This cost is a burden on all students and families, who often forget to budget for such essentials. It is especially troubling for under-privileged and low-income families who do not have the financial wherewithal to make these purchases. Many students attend college through grants, scholarships, and student loans. Money is usually obtainable for living expenses; however, it is rare for this money to be disbursed in time for moving day. This provides a disadvantage and even embarrassment for low-income students who might not be able to purchase all the required essentials and be properly prepared for the start of the school year.
The present invention is directed to overcoming one or more of the problems set forth above.